Every year nearly 100 million tourists travel to Florida to visit the beaches and theme parks, rent a cabana and read a good book, or get away from the cold. It’s windy but dependable, and often the only state in the contiguous U.S. not to be covered in snow. If it’s cold in Florida, you know it’s colder up north.
The state was discovered in 1513 by Ponce de Leon who was searching for the Fountain of Youth. Close enough, he figured, and named it after Spain’s Feast of the Flowers.
Florida’s population swelled by 17.6 percent during the last census. Conservationists fear the day when two bulldozers back into each other from opposite coastlines and 54,000 square miles of beauty will have been embalmed by concrete and condos.
Gov. Rick Scott greets visitors with welcome signs that proclaim “Open for Business.”
You can get what you want in Florida, and you needn’t step on an airplane. Get in the car and take I-91 to New Haven, take a right on I-95 for 1,000 miles to the St. Mary’s River in Georgia, cross the bridge and you’re in the land of coconut trees and orange groves.
And strip malls, convenience stores and fast food joints, for it is the New Jersey of the Caribbean.
Florida’s famous Everglades National Park is complemented by 161 state parks that the department of natural resources refers to as “the real Florida.” A riverboat captain on the Loxahatchee River once said the foggy mornings let him see the Seminole Tribe standing in the mist.
Further inland you’ll pass under canopies of oak along State Road 714 past farmland toward Indiantown and Okeechobee. Stop for a night at Myakka River State Park and stay in a cabin built of coconut logs by Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) workers during the Great Depression.
I’m not a botanist or biologist and I don’t pretend to be Ansel Adams. I used throwaway cameras and have photos stacked in cookie tins but along came the iPhone and the opportunity to transmit images to The Recorder.
Enjoy your Florida vacation, this one’s on me.